Protesters Shut Down DHS Headquarters Construction Site for Second Time

Posted on September 27, 2011 by admin

LISTEN TO RON HARRIS:

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“If we don’t do something about it, it’s going to be like Bolling Joint Air Force Base. They have 13,000 jobs over there [and] only three percent are held by D.C. residents,” Ward 8 Councilmember Marion Barry said last week about the construction of the $3.4 billion Department of Homeland Security headquarters at St. Elizabeths in Anacostia, the largest federal construction project since the building of the Pentagon.

“The only thing this community ever asked for was an opportunity,” said Ron Harris, an organizer with DC Jobs or Else. Harris says too few District residents have been hired to work on the project by Clark Construction, the lead contractor hired by General Services Administration (GSA). The license plates in the parking lot outside the site seem to confirm Harris’s assertion. Of the 151 cars, 72 had Maryland license plates, 68 had Virginia tags, and only 9 were from D.C. (there was one car each from Pennsylvania and West Virginia).

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“Fund Our Communities, Bring the War Dollars Home”: Raskin Discusses the Arab Spring in Silver Spring

Posted on September 26, 2011 by admin

“If they’re having an Arab Spring against militarism and injustice and inequality, can we have an American Spring?” asked Maryland State Senator Jamie Raskin at a Sept. 20 town hall at the Silver Spring Civic Building.

Tuesday’s “Take Back the Budget Debate” was sponsored by over 60 progressive groups from Maryland and organized by the statewide coalition “Fund Our Communities, Bring the War Dollars Home.” Other speakers included State Senator Roger Manno, Heather Boushey with the Center for American Progress and Karen Dolan with the Institute for Policy Studies.


(Video courtesy of Thomas Nephew)

Jean Athey, chair of the Fund Our Communities coalition, said in a press release, “This Town Hall targets the disgraceful budget deal, unending wars, and other current outrages. Money spent on unnecessary wars, weapons systems, and foreign military bases should instead be invested in our communities. We demand a politics that is right and fair and just.” Continue reading →

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Historic McMillan Park: To Whom Does it Belong, the Few or the Many?

Posted on September 23, 2011 by admin

McMillan Park. Photo courtesy of Chris Lewis

LISTEN TO TONY NORMAN:

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“You cannot separate the history of the District of Columbia from the history of the nation.”  – Commissioner Tony Norman

Several decades before the Freedom Riders and sit-ins of the civil rights movement, McMillan Park was delivering devastating blows to segregation one cool gust of wind at a time. Before World War II, when air-conditioning was a rarity, it was common for families, both black and white, to escape D.C.’s summer heat by heading to McMillan Park to sleep out under the stars. Thus, thanks to its constant breeze, McMillan became one of first parks in the country to be integrated.

During World War II, the historic 25-acre park was fenced off and closed to the public for fear that the water purification system it sits atop would be tampered with. Despite promises to reopen the park after the war, the fences remain to this day. Continue reading →

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A Back-to-School Special: Mary Levy Discusses DCPS’s de Facto Segregation, Lack of Transparency, High Turnover and More

Posted on September 20, 2011 by admin

LISTEN TO MARY LEVY:

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The DCPS school year is under way and many students are adjusting to an unfamiliar environment. They’re not alone. A surprising number of both teachers and principals are also completing their first month at their new digs. What impact DCPS’s high teacher and principal turnover has on students is less than clear, like most things with the school system.

Mary Levy is a DCPS budget expert. Her work sheds light on some very dark places. In an extended interview, directly following her Sept. 7 testimony at a D.C. Council hearing on middle schools, Levy discussed DCPS’s increasing de facto segregation, Teach for America, charter schools and more. She began by talking about the lack of transparency in the budget, which she says has gotten worse over the years, despite the internet. Continue reading →

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UMD Charges Students Hefty Fees for Public Documents Related to Treatment of Campus Workers

Posted on September 15, 2011 by admin

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Students at University of Maryland, College Park must come up with $678.26 by Oct. 3 in order to learn what the school’s top administrators have said in internal emails about student organizing efforts for worker justice on campus.

Since UMD is a public university, its records can be requested under the Maryland Public Information Act (MPIA), which is similar to the federal Freedom of Information Act.

In July, student-activist Mary Yanick, who’s now in her first year at Yale Law School, filed an MPIA request for any emails sent to or from a slew of top administrators which mention the words “Daycon,” “Feminism,” “Black Faculty and Staff Association,” or “BFSA.” Continue reading →

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Walter Reed Vigil’s Finale Set for Sept. 30

Posted on September 14, 2011 by admin

Signs at the Friday evening Walter Reed Vigil

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“Even though the hospital is closing and the vigil may be ending here, [we] will carry on in one way or another because the wars are still going on, the wounded are still happening, the blood is still flowing,” Bruce Wolf said Saturday morning, Aug. 27, as he stood on the 7100 block of Georgia Ave in northwest D.C. watching a parade of ambulances remove the last of the patients from the 102-year-old Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

The night before, Wolf stood at that very same spot, as he has each Friday evening from 7 to 9 p.m. for more than six years. Wolf and his wife, Candace, organize the weekly Walter Reed Vigil which calls for an end to the wars and full benefits and treatment for returning soldiers, many of whom are cared for at Walter Reed. Or at least they were.
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Gray Calls for Public Hearing Before Vote on Major Taxi Changes

Posted on September 13, 2011 by admin

Acting taxi chair Linton (left) and Mayor Gray (right)

LISTEN TO HAIMANOT BIZUAYEHU:

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We’re not asking a favor. We are asking the Taxicab Commission to abide by the law. – taxi leader Haimanot Bizuayehu

“I’m sure at the end of the day he and I will be in the same place,” Mayor Vincent Gray said at a Sept. 7 press in response to a question about the different positions he and Ron Linton, the acting-chair of the D.C. Taxicab Commission, have on whether the Commission should hold a public hearing before voting on major changes to D.C.’s taxi regulations.

May 11, at the one hearing held on the proposed amendments to chapters 6 and 8 of Title 31, signs posted on the walls of the Taxicab Commission stated, “NO TELEVISION CAMERAS. NO VIDEO TAPING. NO AUDIO TAPING.”

“I want to underscore again, I believe in transparency,” Gray said. “People will not be excluded from these hearings or other proceedings associated with the Taxicab Commission.” But they have been, which is why Gray called on the Commission to hold a public hearing before voting on changes to the regulatory code. Continue reading →

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Oct. 6, Freedom Plaza May Feel a Bit Like Tahrir Square

Posted on September 12, 2011 by admin

LISTEN TO DAVID SWANSON:

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We will be nonviolently shutting down buildings and offices and hallways and streets. – David Swanson

Oct. 6 marks the end of the first decade of the U.S. war in Afghanistan and the beginning of a nonviolent action that may make D.C.’s Freedom Plaza feel a bit like Egypt’s Tahrir Square. “Thousands and thousands of people have pledged to be there, and not for one day,” said author and activist David Swanson, who is helping organize the event as part of October 2011.

As he stood outside the White House on Sept. 3, the final day of the two-week mass civil disobedience against the Keystone XL pipeline, Swanson discussed the upcoming action, which will see protesters camping out day and night at Freedom Plaza. Continue reading →

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Indigenous Activist Kandi Mossett on the Proposed Keystone XL Pipeline

Posted on September 8, 2011 by admin

Kandi Mossett outside the White House

LISTEN TO KANDI MOSSETT:

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You give respect, you get respect. Right now, we’re not giving respect and we’re paying for it. – Kandi Mossett

“I was getting interviewed and this lady was saying, ‘Well, we obviously need oil. It’s just that’s the way it is,'” recounted Kandi Mossett, an activist with the Indigenous Environmental Network and member of the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation in North Dakota. As she stood outside the White House Sept. 3, the final day of the recent two-week mass civil disobedience against the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, Mossett continued:

First of all, [I told the reporter], “No, we don’t need [oil].” How are you going to tell a group of indigenous folks, who’ve lived here for thousands of years without it, that we need oil when you’ve almost destroyed the world in just two hundred years, since the industrial revolution? Continue reading →

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Upside Down World: Chief Erasmus Discusses the Proposed Keystone XL Pipeline

Posted on September 7, 2011 by admin

Dene Chief Bill Erasmus (Photo courtesy of Josh Lopez)

LISTEN TO BILL ERASMUS:

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The Dene First Nation is located not far from Alaska in Canada’s Northwest Territories. “We’re what is called ‘people that are on top of the world’ because we’re in the most extreme northern parts,”said Bill Erasmus, Dene national chief, as he protested outside the White House on Sept. 3. From their lofty perch, the Dene have an important perspective to offer on how the planet is fairing. The verdict: Not so well. “Our people say the world is upside down.”

In an effort to turn things right side up, Erasmus joined with thousands of others who participated in Tar Sands Action‘s two-week protest against the proposed 1,700 mile Keystone XL oil pipeline, which would stretch from Alberta, Canada to the Gulf Coast. The continued mass civil disobedience in front of the White House, which led to the arrests of 1,252 people, sent an unmistakable message to President Obama, who alone will determine whether the project moves forward: If you approve it, there will be political consequences. Continue reading →

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